This event is offered as a joint sponsorship with the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

About the Topic: Sarah Chayes's book, "Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security," presents an explosive argument: many of today's major world crises -- the ISIS takeover of much of Iraq and Syria, the robust Afghan and Nigerian insurgencies, the Arab Spring and Ukrainian revolutions and their aftermaths -- have their roots in systemic corruption. If this is the case, then the policy priority of addressing corruption must be raised. Rather than a marginal concern to be passed off to development agencies or specialized bureaus, anti-corruption must pervade the conduct of foreign policy. Thieves of State is a riveting book; Chayes will provide a few short readings and reflections on its implications before engaging a conversation with the public. 

About the Speaker: A senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Sarah Chayes served as special assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2010 and 2011. She is an expert on kleptocracy and anti-corruption, civil-military relations, and South Asia policy. Chayes joined the Pentagon after 8 years living and working in Kandahar, Afghanistan, and advising the command of the international forces in Afghanistan. Since leaving government, she has been conducting in-depth research on the security implications of acute corruption in such contexts as the insurgencies in Iraq, Syria, South and Central Asia, and Nigeria, and the revolutions of the Arab Spring and Ukraine. Her work has been dubbed "revolutionary" and "a paradigm shift" by senior professionals in foreign and security policy.

More information on the author and on the book can be found here: http://www.thievesofstate.com/. A basic statement of the argument can be found in this June 6 Carnegie paper, "Corruption: The Unrecognized Threat to International Security." For Sarah's thoughts on the implications for the intelligence community, please read "Corruption: The Priority Intelligence Requirements" in this September 9, 2014 Carnegie publication.

A new generation of leaders has taken the helm in China. They inherit a China that has experienced more than three decades of hyper growth. Yet the Chinese development model is being tested by growing imbalances even while the Chinese leadership faces growing public expectations at home and rising demand abroad. In this lecture, Professor Yang Dali will discuss the challenges to and prospects for China’s governance.

Dali Yang (Ph.D., Princeton, 1993) is the author of numerous books and scholarly articles on the politics and political economy of China. Among his books are Remaking the Chinese Leviathan: Market Transition and the Politics of Governance in China (Stanford University Press, 2004); Beyond Beijing: Liberalization and the Regions in China (Routledge, 1997); and Calamity and Reform in China: State, Rural Society, and Institutional Change since the Great Leap Famine (Stanford University Press, 1996). He is also editor of Discontented Miracle: Growth, Conflict, and Institutional Adaptations in China (World Scientific, 2007) and co-editor and a contributor to Holding China Together: Diversity and National Integration in Post-Deng China (Cambridge University Press, 2004). He is a member of various committees and organizations and serves on the editorial boards of Asian Perspective, American Political Science Review, Journal of Contemporary China, and World Politics.

China’s Conflicting Policy Directions

A climate of uncertainty marks the Xi administration’s second year in power. The unfurling of a nationwide anti-corruption campaign, including high-profile domestic and international targets, may have unintended effects on economic growth. But will these effects be short- or long-lived? Can this campaign build confidence, domestically and internationally, in the party’s governing capacity? Questions also swirl around the motivations for reviving Mao-era language in the political realm while maintaining a relentless urbanization drive in the social and economic realms. In foreign affairs, centrifugal regional forces and suspicion of US intentions in the Pacific must be reconciled with China’s deepening engagement with global institutions and commitment to “opening up” to the world. To address these issues, this series will bring together experts to share research and insights on the underlying logic for the seemingly contradictory policy paths recently chosen by China’s leaders. 

Please note: this talk is off the record.

Democracies do not legally bind parties to their policy promises. Thus winning the power to set policy through elections requires making credible commitments to pivotal voters. This paper analyzes theoretically and empirically how the commitment problem affects partisan conflict over redistribution. A theoretical model shows that under majoritarian electoral rules parties' efforts to achieve endogenous commitment using citizen candidates to policies preferred by the middle class leads to different behavior and outcomes than suggested by existing theories that assume commitment or rule out endogenous commitment. Left parties may respond to rising inequality by moving to the right in majoritarian systems but not under proportional representation. The theory also unbundles the anti-left bias attributed to majoritarian systems. The empirical analysis finds evidence for key implications of this logic using panel data on party positions and by analyzing devolution in Britain as a natural experiment to compare candidates under alternative electoral rules.

This talk is part of The Europe Center's "European Governance Seminar Series."

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In an effort to infuse Asian studies in the social studies and literature curricula, the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE), in cooperation with the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia (NCTA), is offering a professional development opportunity at Stanford University.

This all day workshop will focus on teaching about religion in China and Japan and the influence of Daoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism. Participants will hear from top China and Japan scholars, engage in China and Japan related curriculum, and network with other local teachers.  This is the fourth seminar in a four part series.

In an effort to infuse Asian studies in the social studies and literature curricula, the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE), in cooperation with the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia (NCTA), is offering a professional development opportunity at Stanford University.

This all day workshop will focus on teaching about ancient China and the Silk Road. Participants will hear from top China scholars, engage in China related curriculum, and network with other local teachers.  This is the second seminar in a four part series.

In an effort to infuse Asian studies in the social studies and literature curricula, the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE), in cooperation with the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia (NCTA), is offering a professional development opportunity at Stanford University.

This all day workshop will focus on teaching about issues Asian American face in contemporary society. This is the fourth workshop in a four part series.

In an effort to infuse Asian studies in the social studies and literature curricula, the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE), in cooperation with the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia (NCTA), is offering a professional development opportunity at Stanford University.

This all day workshop will focus on teaching about Korea in the social studies classroom. Participants will hear from top Korea scholars, engage in Korea related curriculum, and network with other local teachers.  This is the third workshop in a four part series.